City, County Planners to Present Proposal on Engineer

Buffalo City Planner Zach Montgomery and Johnson County Planner Rob Yingling will be presenting a proposal for a joint city/county civil engineer at both entity's meetings Tuesday, September 6.

Montgomery explains why the entities are looking into hiring an engineer.

Montgomery said he and Yingling have researched every comparable community to Buffalo in the state, asking if they contracted engineering services or had an engineer on staff. What they found is that four are paying in excess of $250,000 per year for contract engineering services, and those were just the cities, not including counties. Some, he said, are paying significantly more.

Compared to the salary of an engineer, split between the city and county, they have shown a possible significant savings to both.

Should the city council and county commission approve the idea, Montgomery explains what will happen next.

The planners will present the proposal at the County Commissioner's meeting Tuesday at 10am, and at City Council's meeting at 5pm.